there's a knocking in my brain...

I've spent the day today working on everything except the novel, but I'm finding that Abraham and Darius - one of the slaves who worked for him in the pottery - are taking up headspace. Rattling around and knocking and demanding to be heard.
Right now I am struggling to hear their words, but I can see them very clearly.

It is early morning. The mountain is covered in mist, reaching about halfway down, with just occasional glimpses of the top peeking through.

The weather has been warm for the past few days, but today the mist has brought a crisp coldness and a promise that winter is not far away.

Abraham's house is uphill from the pottery, with a view of the Company's garden below and Table Mountain and Lion's Head to the right and behind him.

silver tree. It is the only tree that grows naturally in the City Bowl. It is a member of the protea family

the house is not as grand as this, but this is what the garden looks like

The house is on the outskirts of the town. There are silver trees  in the garden, and Abraham has planted some oaks for shade.

The silver trees look their best in this weather - leaves shimmering in the soft light.

The spring, with its clean, sweet water, emerges just below the house into a natural pool

Abraham and his men have built a leiwater channel which feeds water to the pottery when the sluice is lifted. The rest of the water is channelled down through the Company's Garden and into the Heerengracht.

I think that the houses where the slaves lived and where the pottery is made look more like these. This is the Genadendal mission station that was established in 1738.

Capturing the relentlessness of the rain

Days and days of relentless, unending rain. It seemed like there was no way it could go on, and yet it did. Grey skies, mud, puddles and even small lakes where before there had just been fields. The earth could scarcely absorb another drop, and yet the rain continued. On and on, day after day, with scarcely a moment of relief. Maybe the odd moment or two of sunshine, but always another dark bank of clouds on the horizon, promising that the sunshine would be short-lived. Temperatures hovered around 5-6°C, adding to the general sense of cold and damp. Nothing dried in these conditions. Laundry remained damp and began to smell musty. The ground water seeped up through the brick floor of the pantry. The hens, even when the door was opened so they could go out and scratch about, huddled inside, murmuring their complaints, loathe to get soaked. Even the snowdrops, normally the most hardy of souls, were tattered and drooping, their frilly white heads bowed heavily with raindrops. It didn't even really matter that the light was returning to these northern climes, as the greyness of the skies and the eternal rain, made everything colorless and cast a dusk-like pallor over the whole day. We didn't know how much more we could take.